which the belief of Christianity is founded are sufficiently attested. The following paragraph is characteristic:

I do not hesitate to affirm that our religion has been indebted to the attempts, though not to the intentions, of its bitterest enemies. They have tried its strength, indeed, and, by trying, they have displayed its strength; and that in so clear a light, as we could never have hoped, without such a trial, to have viewed it in. Let them, therefore, write; let them argue, and when arguments fail, even let them cavil against religion as much as they please; I should be heartily sorry that ever in this island, the asylum of liberty, where the spirit of Christianity is better understood-however defective the inhabitants are in the observance of its precepts-than in any other part of the Christian world; I should, I say, be sorry that in this island so great a disservice were done to religion as to check its adversaries in any other way than by returning a candid answer to their objec tions. I must at the same time acknowledge, that I am both ashamed and grieved when I observe any friends of religion betray so great a diffidence in the goodness of their cause for to this diffidence alone can it be imputed -as to shew an inclination for recurring to more forcible methods. The assaults of infidels, I may venture to prophesy, will never overturn our religion. They will prove not more hurtful to the Christian system, if it be allowed to compare small things with the greatest, than the boisterous winds are said to prove to the sturdy oak. They shake it impetuously for a time, and loudly threaten its subversion; whilst in effect they only serve to make it strike its roots the deeper, and stand the firmer ever after.

Richard Hurd (1720-1808), called the 'Beauty of Holiness' on account of his comeliness and piety, was born at Congreve in Staffordshire, and became a Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in 1742. In 1750 he became a Whitehall preacher, in 1774 Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry, and in 1781 of Worcester. Among his many works, theological and other, were a Commentary on Horace's Ars Poetica (1749); Dissertations on Poetry (1755-57); Dialogues on Sincerity (1759), his most popular book; Letters on Chivalry and Romance (1762), which revived interest in an unfashionable subject, and promoted the tendency towards romanticism in literary taste; Dialogues on Foreign Travel (1764); and An Introduction to the Prophecies (1772). He was long a very conspicuous and 'representative' author; Gibbon knew few writers more deserving of the great though prostituted name of the critic;' but he is now rarely cited and more rarely read. A collected edition of his works appeared in eight volumes in 1811; there is a memoir by Kilvert (1860).

Richard Price (1723-91), a Nonconformist divine, published in 1758 A Review of the Principal Questions and Difficulties in Morals, which attracted attention as an attempt to revive the intellectual theory of moral obligation, which seemed to have fallen under the attacks of Butler, Hutcheson, and Hume, even before Smith.' The son of a minister at Tynton in Glamorgan, Price

at seventeen went to a Dissenting academy in London, became a preacher at Newington Green and Hackney, and established a reputation by his Review and a work on the Importance of Christianity (1766). In 1769 he was made D.D. by Glasgow, and published his Treatise on Reversionary Payments, the celebrated Northampton Mortality Tables, and other books on finance and political economy. In 1771 appeared his Appeal on the National Debt; in 1776 his Observations on Civil Liberty and the War with America, which brought him an invitation from Congress to assist in regulating its finances. He took an active part in the political questions of the day at the time of the French Revolution. He was a republican in principle, and was attacked by Burke in his Reflections on the Revolution. In his great ethical treatise, Price, after Cudworth, supports the doctrine that moral distinctions being perceived by reason, or the understanding, are equally immutable with all other kinds of truth. Actions are in themselves right or wrong: right and wrong are simple ideas incapable of analysis, and are given us by the intuitive power of the reason or understanding. There is a Life of Price by Morgan (1815). The following extract from the chapter in the Observations on English policy towards America, published while the war was in progress, shows how hearty were some of the supporters the colonists found in the home division of the Empire, as Price already called the British dominions :

Our governors, ever since I can remember, have been jealous that the Colonies, some time or other, would throw off their dependence. This jealousy was not founded on any of their acts or declarations. They have always, while at peace with us, disclaimed any such design; and they have continued to disclaim it since they have been at war with us. I have reason, indeed, to believe that independency is, even at this moment, generally dreaded among them as a calamity to which they are in danger of being driven, in order to avoid a greater.—The jealousy I have mentioned was, however, natural; and betrayed a secret opinion that the subjection in which they were held was more than we could expect them always to endure. In such circumstances, all possible care should have been taken to give them no reason for discontent; and to preserve them in subjection, by keeping in that line of conduct to which custom had reconciled them, or at least never deviating from it, except with great caution; and particularly, by avoiding all direct attacks on their property and legislations. Had we done this, the different interests of so many states scattered over a vast continent, joined to our own prudence and moderation, would have enabled us to maintain them in dependence for ages to come. But instead of this, how have we acted?It is in truth too evident, that our whole conduct, instead of being directed by that sound policy and foresight which in such circumstances were absolutely necessary, has been nothing (to say the best of it) but a series of the blindest rigour followed by retractation; of violence followed by concession; of mistake, weakness and inconsistency.

A recital of a few facts within everybody's recollection will fully prove this.

In the 6th of George the Second, an act was passed for imposing certain duties on all foreign spirits, molasses and sugars imported into the plantations. In this act, the duties imposed are said to be given and granted by the Parliament to the King; and this is the first American act in which these words have been used. But notwithstanding this, as the act had the appearance of being only a regulation of trade, the colonies submitted to it; and a small direct revenue was drawn by it from them. In the 4th of the present reign, many alterations were made in this act, with the declared purpose of making provision for raising a revenue in America. This alarmed the Colonies; and produced discontents and remonstrances, which might have convinced our rulers this was tender ground, on which it became them to tread very gently.There is, however, no reason to doubt but in time they would have sunk into a quiet submission to this revenue act, as being at worst only the exercise of a power which then they seem not to have thought much of contesting; I mean, the power of taxing them externally.- -But before they had time to cool, a worse provocation was given them; and the Stamp-Act was passed. This being an attempt to tax them internally, and a direct attack on their property, by a power which would not suffer itself to be questioned; which eased itself by loading them; and to which it was impossible to fix any bounds; they were thrown at once, from one end of the continent to the other, into resistance and rage.- -Government, dreading the consequences, gave way; and the Parliament (upon a change of ministry) repealed the Stamp-Act, without requiring from them any recognition of its authority, or doing any more to preserve its dignity, than asserting, by the declaratory law, that it was possessed of full power and authority to make laws to bind them in all cases whatever.- - Upon this peace was restored; and, had no further attempts of the same kind been made, they would undoubtedly have suffered us (as the people of Ireland have done) to enjoy quietly our declaratory law. They would have recovered their former habits of subjection; and our connection with them might have continued an increasing source of our wealth and glory.- -But the spirit of despotism and avarice, always blind and restless, soon broke forth again. The scheme for drawing a revenue from America, by parliamentary taxation, was resumed ; and in a little more than a year after the repeal of the Stamp-Act, when all was peace, a third act was passed, imposing duties payable in America on tea, paper, glass, painters colours, &c.- -This, as might have been expected, revived all the former heats; and the Empire was a second time threatened with the most dangerous commotions.-Government receded again; and the Parliament (under another change of ministry) repealed all the obnoxious duties, except that upon tea. This exception was made in order to maintain a shew of dignity. But it was, in reality, sacrificing safety to pride; and leaving a splinter in the wound to produce a gangrene.-For some time, however, this relaxation answered its intended purposes. Our commercial intercourse with the Colonies was again recovered; and they avoided nothing but that tea which we had excepted in our repeal. In this state

would things have remained, and even tea would perhaps in time have been gradually admitted, had not the evil genius of Britain stepped forth once more to embroil the Empire.

Ships

The East India Company having fallen under difficulties, partly in consequence of the loss of the American market for tea, a scheme was formed for assisting them by an attempt to recover that market. With this view an act was passed to enable them to export their tea to America free of all duties here, and subject only to 3d per pound duty, payable in America. By this expedient they were enabled to offer it at a low price; and it was expected the consequence would prove that the Colonies would be tempted by it; a precedent gained for taxing them, and at the same time the company relieved. were, therefore, fitted out; and large cargoes sent. The snare was too gross to escape the notice of the Colonies. They saw it, and spurned at it. They refused to admit the tea; and at Boston some persons in disguise buried it in the sea.— -Had our governors in this case satisfied themselves with requiring a compensation from the province for the damage done, there is no doubt but it would have been granted. Or had they proceeded no further in the infliction of punishment than stopping up the port and destroying the trade of Boston till compensation was made, the province might possibly have submitted, and a sufficient saving would have been gained for the honour of the nation. But having hitherto proceeded without wisdom, they observed now no bounds in their resentment. To the Boston port bill was added a bill which destroyed the chartered government of the province; a bill which withdrew from the jurisdiction of the province persons who in particular cases should commit murder; and the Quebec bill. At the same time a strong body of troops was stationed at Boston to enforce obedience to these bills.

All who knew any thing of the temper of the Colonies saw that the effect of this sudden accumulation of vengeance, would probably be not intimidating but exasperating them, and driving them into a general revolt. But our ministers had different apprehensions. They believed that the malecontents in the Colony of Massachusetts were a small party, headed by a few factious men; that the majority of the people would take the side of government, as soon as they saw a force among them capable of supporting them; that at worst the Colonies in general would never make common cause with this province; and that the issue would prove in a few months order, tranquillity and submission. Every one of these apprehensions was falsified by the events that followed.

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When the bills I have mentioned came to be carried into execution, the whole Province was thrown into confusion. Their courts of justice were shut up, and all government was dissolved. The commander in chief found it necessary to fortify himself in Boston; and the other Colonies immediately resolved to make a common cause with this Colony.

Disappointed by these consequences, our ministers took fright. Once more they made an effort to retreat; but indeed the most ungracious one that can well be imagined. A proposal was sent to the Colonies, called Conciliatory; and the substance of which was, that if any of them would raise such sums as should be

demanded of them by taxing themselves, the Parliament would forbear to tax them. It will be scarcely believed hereafter that such a proposal could be thought conciliatory. It was only telling them: 'If you will tax yourselves by our order, we will save ourselves the trouble of taxing you.'-They received the proposal as an insult; and rejected it with disdain.

At the time this concession was transmitted to America, open hostilities were not begun. In the sword our ministers thought they had still a resource which would immediately settle all disputes. They considered the people of New-England as nothing but a mob, who would be soon routed and forced into obedience. It was even believed that a few thousands of our army might march through all America, and make all quiet wherever they went. Under this conviction our ministers did not dread urging the Province of Massachusetts Bay into rebellion, by ordering the army to seize their stores, and to take up some of their leading men. -The attempt was made.The people fled immediately to arms, and repelled the attack. -A considerable part of the flower of the British army has been destroyed.- -Some of our best Generals, and the bravest of our troops, are now disgracefully and miserably imprisoned at Boston.-————A horrid civil war is commenced ;- -And the Empire is distracted and convulsed.

Can it be possible to think with patience of the policy that has brought us into these circumstances? Did ever Heaven punish the vices of a people more severely by darkening their counsels? How great would be our happiness could we now recall former times, and return to the policy of the last reigns!— But those times are gone. I will, however, beg leave for a few moments to look back to them; and to compare the ground we have left with that on which we find ourselves. This must be done with deep regret; but it forms a necessary part of my present design.

Adam Ferguson (1723-1816), son of the minister of Logierait in Perthshire, was educated at St Andrews; removing to Edinburgh for divinity studies, he became an associate of Robertson, Blair, and Home. As chaplain to the Black Watch he was present at Fontenoy, but in 1754 left the army (and the clerical profession), succeeding David Hume in 1757 as keeper of the Advocates' Library. He was afterwards Professor of Natural Philosophy and of Moral Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh. In 1778 he went to America as secretary to the commissioners appointed to negotiate with the revolted colonies. On his return he resumed the duties of his professorship. His latter days were spent in ease and affluence at St Andrews, where he died at the patriarchal age of ninety-two. The works of Ferguson are: Essay on Civil Society (published in 1766), Institutes of Moral Philosophy (1772), A Reply to Dr Price on Civil and Religious Liberty (1776), The History of the Progress and Termination of the Roman Republic (1783), and Principles of Moral and Political Science (1792). His History of the Roman Republic was translated into French and German, and long remained a standard authority

(4th ed. 1825). Sir Walter Scott supplied some interesting information as to the latter years of this venerable professor, whom he considered the most striking example of a modern Stoic philosopher; in Ferguson's house Scott as a boy had met Burns. Lord Cockburn also left a graphic account of the venerable man. He had a warning of paralysis in the fiftieth year of his life, from which period he became a strict Pythagorean in his diet, eating nothing but vegetables, and drinking only water or milk. The deep interest which he took in the French war had long seemed to be the main tie which connected him with passing existence; Scott says, 'The news of Waterloo acted on the aged patriot as a nunc dimittis. There is a Life of Ferguson by Small (1864).

Climate and Civilisation.

On this scene mankind have twice within the compass of history ascended from rude beginnings to very high degrees of refinement. In every age, whether destined by its temporary disposition to build or to destroy, they have left the vestiges of an active and vehement spirit. The pavement and the ruins of Rome are buried in dust, shaken from the feet of barbarians who trod with contempt on the refinements of luxury, and spurned those arts the use of which it was reserved for the posterity of the same people to discover and to admire. The tents of the wild Arab are even now pitched among the ruins of magnificent cities; and the waste fields which border on Palestine and Syria are perhaps to become again the nursery of infant nations. The chieftain of an Arab tribe, like the founder of Rome, may have already fixed the roots of a plant that is to flourish in some future period, or laid the foundations of a fabric that will attain to its grandeur in some distant age.

Great part of Africa has been always unknown; but the silence of fame on the subject of its revolutions is an argument, where no other proof can be found, of weakness in the genius of its people. The torrid zone everywhere round the globe, however known to the geographer, has furnished few materials for history; and though in many places supplied with the arts of life in no contemptible degree, has nowhere matured the more important projects of political wisdom, nor inspired the virtues which are connected with freedom, and which are required in the conduct of civil affairs. It was indeed in the torrid zone that mere arts of mechanism and manufacture were found, among the inhabitants of the new world, to have made the greatest advance; it is in India, and in the regions of this hemisphere which are visited by the vertical sun, that the arts of manufac ture and the practice of commerce are of the greatest antiquity, and have survived, with the smallest diminution, the ruins of time and the revolutions of empire. The sun, it seems, which ripens the pine-apple and the tamarind, inspires a degree of mildness that can even assuage the rigours of despotical government: and such is the effect of a gentle and pacific disposition in the natives of the East, that no conquest, no irruption of barbarians, terminates, as they did among the stubborn natives of Europe, by a total destruction of what the love of ease and of pleasure had produced. . . .

Man, in the perfection of his natural faculties, is quick and delicate in his sensibility; extensive and various in

his imaginations and reflections; attentive, penetrating, and subtle in what relates to his fellow-creatures; firm and ardent in his purposes; devoted to friendship or to enmity; jealous of his independence and his honour, which he will not relinquish for safety or for profit; under all his corruptions or improvements, he retains his natural sensibility, if not his force; and his commerce is a blessing or a curse, according to the direction his mind has received. But under the extremes of heat or of cold, the active range of the human soul appears to be limited; and men are of inferior importance, either as friends or as enemies. In the one extreme, they are dull and slow, moderate in their desires, regular and pacific in their manner of life; in the other, they are feverish in their passions, weak in their judgments, and addicted by temperament to animal pleasure. In both, the heart is mercenary, and makes important concessions for childish bribes: in both, the spirit is prepared for servitude; in the one, it is subdued by fear of the future; in the other, it is not roused even by its sense of the present.

(From the Essay on Civil Society.)

David Garrick (1717-79), the greatest of all English actors, was also author of some dramatic pieces. He was a native of Hereford, though his family belonged to Lichfield, where he got most of his schooling; for a few months only he was a pupil of Samuel Johnson at Edial, and with him he came to London in 1737 to push his fortune. He entered himself a student of Lincoln's Inn, but receiving a legacy of £1000 from an uncle who had been in the wine-trade in Lisbon, he commenced business, in partnership

with an elder brother, as wine-merchant of

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London and Lichfield. A passion for the stage led him into a new life. In 1741 he appeared at Ipswich in Southerne's Oroonoko; in the same year his success as Richard III. in London was immense. His merits quickly raised him to the head of his profession; the traditional formality disappeared before the perfect naturalness of the new actor, great alike in tragedy, comedy, and farce. As the manager of Drury Lane Theatre for a long course of years (1747–76), he banished from the stage-or reconstructed -many plays of vulgar and immoral type; and his personal character, though marked by vanity and other foibles, gave a dignity and respectability to the profession of an actor. author he was more lively and various than imposing or original. He wrote some epigrams, and even ventured on an ode or two; his forty dramatic pieces, many of them adaptations, are of no great importance, indeed; but some of his many prologues and epilogues, to other people's plays as well as his own, are admirable. fellow feeling makes one wondrous kind' comes from Garrick's last prologue, and not from Shakespeare, though it is doubtless based on 'A touch of nature makes the whole world kin' in its usual acceptation; the credit of Garrick's line is often given to Byron, who quotes it in English Bards with 'one' changed to us.' 'The

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Suppose the babes I smother'd in the tower,
By chance, or sickness, lose their acting power;
Shall they, once princes, worse than all be serv'd?
In childhood murder'd, and when murder'd, starv'd!
Matrons half ravish'd for your recreation,

In age should never want some consolation :
Can I, young Hamlet once, to nature lost,
Behold, O horrible! my father's ghost,

With grizzly beard, pale cheek, stalk up and down,
And he, the royal Dane, want half a crown?
Forbid it, ladies; gentlemen forbid it;
Give joy to age, and let 'em say—you did it.

i.e. the gallery.

To you, ye Gods! I make my last appeal; You have a right to judge, as well as feel; Will your high wisdom to our scheme incline, That kings, queens, heroes, gods, and ghosts may dine? Olympus shakes!-that omen all secures ; May ev'ry joy you give, be tenfold yours.

In an edition of his Dramatic Works (sixteen plays) published by his own authority in 1768, one of the three volumes consists of Romeo and Juliet, Cymbeline, Catharine and Petruchio (i.e. The Taming of the Shrew), Florizel and Perdita (The Winter's Tale)-described as 'altered from Shakespeare-and Every Man in his Humour, altered from Jonson. In altering he not merely cut out whole sections, but rewrote largely, and even (as to Romeo and Juliet) added a new scene on occasion. In the advertisement to the same play he (or his editor for him) explains how he sought to clear the original as much as possible from the jingle and quibbling which were always the objections to the reviving of it,' to remove a serious blemish in Romeo's character,' and to return to Bandello for parts of the story 'injudiciously left out'-such as Juliet's waking in the tomb before Romeo's death. Obviously he aimed deliberately to Bowdlerise Shakespeare half a century before Bowdler. And by taking the same freedom with Wycherley (where it was certainly needed) he made even the Country Wife presentable (as the Country Girl) to the taste of his contemporaries. Of his own plays probably the best were The Lying Valet and Miss in her Teens. But Garrick's chief strength lay in his powers as an actor, through which he gave a popularity and importance to the drama that it had not possessed since its palmy days in the reigns of Elizabeth and James.

There are Lives of Garrick by Percy Fitzgerald (1888) and Joseph Knight (1804), besides the older ones by Tom Davies (1780) and Murphy (1801); and to his Correspondence (2 vols. folio, 1832) a memoir by Boaden was prefixed. (For his wife, see page 416.)

Samuel Foote (1720-77) was the greatest of the dramatic authors of the class he represented. He was born at Truro in Cornwall, of a good family, studied at Worcester College, Oxford, and entered the Temple; but squandering away his fortune, he became an actor and dramatic writer. In power of mimicry and broad humour Foote had few equals; and in 1747 he commenced as sole performer his very popular new entertainments in

the Haymarket Theatre, which turned on humorous and whimsical portraits of character, many of them transcripts or caricatures of persons well known. The Diversions of the Morning, The Auction of Pictures, and The Englishman in Paris were the names of some of these pieces. Johnson disliked him for his easy morals and his making the burlesquing of private characters a profession, and threatened to chastise him on the stage if he caricatured him; but when he met him at dinner, though he was resolved not to be pleased,' 'the dog was so comical that I was obliged to lay down my knife and fork, throw myself back upon my chair, and fairly laugh it out.' Of Foote's later and regular farces, The Minor—an unjustifiable attack upon the Methodists -was the most successful. It was followed by The Liar, an adaptation from Corneille, and by The Mayor of Garratt, a coarse but humorous sketch, including two characters-Major Sturgeon, the city militia officer, and Jerry Sneak-which can never be completely forgotten. Having lost his leg through an accident in riding, Foote produced plays one of them The Lame Lover (1770) -in which his new personal disability might be rendered positively serviceable. His plays and pieces were about twenty in number, and he boasted at the close of his life that he had added sixteen quite new characters to the English stage.

From The Lame Lover.'

Charlotte. Sir, I have other proofs of your hero's vanity not inferior to that I have mentioned. Serjeant Circuit. Cite them.

Char. The paltry ambition of levying and following titles.

Serj. Titles! I don't understand you.

Char. I mean the poverty of fastening in public upon men of distinction, for no other reason but because of their rank; adhering to Sir John till the baronet is superseded by my lord; quitting the puny peer for an earl; and sacrificing all three to a duke.

Serj. Keeping good company!—a laudable ambition! Char. True, sir, if the virtues that procured the father a peerage could with that be entailed on the son. Serj. Have a care, hussy; there are against speaking evil of dignities.

Char. Sir!

severe laws

Serj. Scandalum magnatum is a statute must not be trifled with why, you are not one of those vulgar sluts that think a man the worse for being a lord?

Char. No, sir; I am contented with only not thinking him the better.

Serj. For all this, I believe, hussy, a right honourable proposal would soon make you alter your mind.

Char. Not unless the proposer had other qualities than what he possesses by patent. Besides, sir, you know Sir Luke is a devotee to the bottle.

Serj. Not a whit the less honest for that.

Char. It occasions one evil at least; that when under its influence, he generally reveals all, sometimes more than he knows.

Serj. Proofs of an open temper, you baggage; but come, come, all these are but trifling objections.